Saturday, July 30, 2011

I was hoping to make it until Wednesday before spraying again. I made an application this morning to stop Brown Patch and Dollar Spot that appeared. The hot spots at Lansing CC are #9 and the putting green. I would say that they have micro climits the favor disease. Poor light and air circulation encourage disease. Links style courses with few trees tend to have less disease. This year, disease pressure has been greater than normal. Preventative sprays that last 14 days are only making it 10 days. For budget purposes, I leave room for a couple sprays like this. If we go back to normal temps the rest of the year, it would really help the situation. These spots should heal up in the next couple of weeks. If they don't, I'll add some seed at aerifing time.

Friday, July 29, 2011

We got only .25 overnight. It was much heavier to the North and South. The course really greened up this last week. The forecast is dry and warm for the weekend and up until Tuesday. That should make for a great weekend. We kept only #14 to cart paths only, and hopefully will open it back up on Saturday. We will catch up on some mowing on Saturday and Sunday. I let the crew go home early on Thurday with the rain. They are tired from the heat and took advantage of the afternoon off.

We started work on a project behind the practice tee. Plans are for a putting green or chipping green. It should be seeding by the end of the month. I hope it would be ready for play next spring.

Plans for Greens aerifation are mid September followed by Tees and Small Fairways. We will be doing this in house to save money this year. I can't wait any longer because I need to cut staff October 1. Also, the earlier I start, the more time we have until the first frost. Frost really slows the process down. The average first frost is around October 10.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

We only had .5 inches of rain last night. Our total for the month is 3.2 inches which is below average. Most of Chicago is at record levels.

We got the Tony Lema sign ready last week. I missed the dedication, but I heard it was a nice ceremony.

The hot humid weather is taking its toll on some of our turf. This picture shows poa under stress on #1 collar. We hand watered these areas and backed off on mowing the last couple of weeks to help our greens, tees and fairways.

Friday, July 22, 2011

We got .7 inches of rain on Friday. After taking a few days off of mowing we started up again. Greens speeds should be better. The rain was kind of unexpected. Scott and I had weather.com on at 7 am with all rain up on the border. At 10:45 it came. The front dropped about 50 miles and the cool air hit the warm humid air. We needed the rain and it should soak in nicely. Jose started raking the bunkers after lunch and we should finish on Saturday for the Copper Muggers.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

We hit 100 again today. That's 2 in a row. A couple of years ago we only had 5 days in the 90's all summer. 90 on Friday will seem cool. We skipped mowing greens, tees and fairways again today. We instead rolled the greens. I had Dave raise the height of cut on greens for Friday and the weekends. I'm affraid we'll damage turf if we stay at the lower cut. We'll go back to normal when it gets cooler. After being wet in April, May and June, we now have drought contions. The forecast is for rain on Friday and Saturday, but only 50%. We could really use .5 inches. The course is holding up, but another week of this could really hurt the rough. It might stay brown for the rest of the season.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Come out early and beat the heat the next couple of days. We are backing off on some of the mowing to help the turf get through the extreme heat. We are doing more hand watering to get through the day. Too much water in this heat can create a situation for disease. If you play, drink plenty of water or Gatorade.

Friday, July 15, 2011

Water management will be critical in the next 10 days. High temps are expected. The easy thing to do is irrigate at night. A better option is to irrigate and hand water. Some of our greens have isolated dry spots. Instead of watering the entire green, we try and hand water these small areas. This will help keep our greens health.

This is another image of the reason why we aerify. Notice the darker soil on the bottom. Roots can't penetrate this native soil. This comes from the putting green, our worst green to maintain in my opinion. On most of our greens, the deep tine aerifier can penetrate twice the depth.

This picture shows that our fungicide program is working on the greens. Notice the line in the approach where dollar spot begins. This line is where I turn off/on the sprayer as I make an application. I currently spray greens preventative, tees curative and fairways only preventative for grubs and crab grass.

This is garbage near the lake. Please pick up garbage when you fish. This could end up in the lake and clog the irrigation intake or get into one of the pumps.﻿

Sunday, July 10, 2011

The heat is back. We also haven't got any rainfall since the July 1. We are finally using the irrigation system on a regular basis. We could use about a half inch this week. If you are a fisherman, we generally start the sprinklers running at about 9:30. The system starts #1 and #7 fairway first. As dusk gets earlier, I generally start the sprinklers earlier.

This is Juan and Jose D. Juan is a 4 year veteran. Juan is an all around worker as he can mow rough, fairways, tees and greens. He also does a lot of landscaping work including pruning and planting of flowers. He also does some handwatering. He is a father of 3. Jose D. is a first year worker. He comes to us with a landscaping background. He currently mows fairways and greens and rakes the bunkers. Jose is also a father of 3

Saturday, July 2, 2011

The total rain for the last storm was 1.1 inches. We can handle about .75 inches before we have problems. There was also heavy winds the created a mess of branches. While I sprayed the tees, Jose Duran spent the morning picking up as many branches as possible.

I needed to spray the tees today for the most common disease in Chicago. Dollar Spot is liking the humid wet conditions. I usually wait to spray tees until it becomes noticeable. Greens are sprayed on a preventable schedule. I would spray fairways, but the cost would more than than triple our chemical budget.

I mowed an area on the project by the pump house. It is really starting to take shape. It been very hard to accomplish anything with the wet weather. Doug is making a holding pond and road currently. This pond will hold water as the ditch line goes down. This will aid in preventing flooding. The road will give us access to #12 making transport times shorter and less traffic along #10 and the driving range.

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About Me

Golf Course Superintendent at Lansing Country Club since 2008. Previously I worked at Joe Louis Golf Course, George Dunne National Golf Course, Cress Creek Country Club, Bryn Mawr Country Club, Minnesota Valley Country Club and Interlachen Country Club.